


Never Let You Go

by kaeorin



Series: Loki's Lullabies [178]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Comfort, Cuddling & Snuggling, Domestic Avengers, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Loki (Marvel) Needs a Hug, Reader-Insert, Self-Esteem Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-23 04:27:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30049887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaeorin/pseuds/kaeorin
Summary: You’re a cuddler. Loki is not. When your self-doubt grows larger and larger, can you find a way to make it work?
Relationships: Loki (Marvel)/Reader
Series: Loki's Lullabies [178]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1678240
Comments: 10
Kudos: 192





	Never Let You Go

Loki was not much of a cuddler. You’d known that from his first moments there in the Tower. \Thor had thrown his arms around him and rattled him around a little, and you hadn’t missed the way Loki had tried to cringe away. The way he’d stepped away from his brother as soon as he could and very carefully adjusted his clothing. But, even back then, the movement hadn’t read as “prissy” to you, but “self-soothing”. Early on, when you were still trying to convince yourself that your feelings for him were purely friendly, you still had to fight hard against your own nature. You were a tactile person. You liked touching people: stroking their arms, leaning into them while you laughed, holding their hands and touching their hair. But of course you knew that not everybody liked that. You’d had plenty of friends, through the course of your life, who preferred you to keep your hands to yourself, and you were perfectly capable of adapting to their needs. 

So it was honestly kind of embarrassing, how intensely Loki seemed to call out to you. You wanted to smooth your fingers along his brow so you could ease away the tension that so often perched there. You wanted to caress his arm when the rest of the team spent a little too long making jokes at his expense: a show of solidarity, not pity. You wanted to run your fingers through his hair and find out if it was truly as soft and lovely as it looked. Maybe your self-control bled over a little and made you a little too stiff around him, but he seemed to appreciate your company nonetheless in that quiet way he had.

But over time, you started slipping. The first time that you nudged him with your knee at the dinner table, he didn’t flinch away or glared at you. If anything, when he looked at you, you were almost certain that there was something like curiosity in his eyes. It kept you from mumbling your apology. You kept things like that for a long time—low-key, just careful brushes against him here and there, followed by a hasty retreat in case you were crowding him. He never flinched away from you.

One night you fell asleep on him by accident. It was a movie night, and you should have sat things out because you’d only just gotten back from the toughest mission you’d ever taken, but you were aching for something normal. Aching to sit there surrounded by your friends and teammates and just do something that other people did. So you’d gone and dropped yourself into your place on the love seat next to Loki. The next thing you knew, your face was smashed against his shoulder and you were reasonably certain that you’d been full-on snoring and drooling on that gorgeous, standoffish man. 

“Oh my god,” you’d whispered as you reached out to rub at the damp patch on his arm. “Oh my god, Loki, fuck, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—” That was it. He was never going to let you be near him again. Whatever tentative friendship had been growing between you, you’d made him irrevocably uncomfortable and he had been decent enough not to wake you up or push you away from him.

But before your brain could spiral out of control, he’d looked over at you in the darkness of the room, and his face had not held a single trace of discomfort. He’d smiled at you, so soft and sweet and tender that it made your mind stumble to a halt. He’d leaned in a little closer to whisper to you.

“You’ve nothing to apologize for. I’m only glad you got to rest.”

And then—miracle of miracles—he’d put his arm around you to pull you in close to him again and guided your head down to his shoulder. If you hadn’t been so exhausted, you might have laid there a while, worrying about whether he was truly okay with this or if your head felt too heavy or if you were breathing too loud, but you could hear faint traces of his heartbeat and you were surrounded with the cool, comforting scent of him, and so you’d just closed your eyes and slept in his arms. 

The floodgates broke after that. On your worst days, you still tried to keep yourself distant, in case that night hadn’t meant that he wanted you all over him at all hours, but you were a lot less hesitant (on your good days) to throw your arms around him or to reach out to take his hand. You hadn’t meant to fall for him. It wasn’t what he needed. But he just kept looking at you with that look in his eyes and your soft, foolish heart was a goner. 

Thankfully, it didn’t take long before he confessed the same kinds of unthinkable feelings about you.

So now, most of the time, you were not far apart. You loved sitting with him on the couch, whether it was for a movie night or for reading or just for enjoying one another’s company. He’d slide his arm around your shoulders and you would tuck yourself against his body and then you’d just sit there like that for ages. When you slept in the same bed, you were in constant contact with him: if you weren’t laying on his chest, he was holding you close from behind. You loved running your fingers along his chest, tracing his faint chest hair, circling his nipples almost idly, until he stilled your hand with his and scolded you for tickling him. You loved feeling his breath on your shoulder when he held you. Even in his sleep, he held you so firmly, like he couldn’t bear the thought of being without you. It wasn’t uncommon for the two of you to be so tangled up in bed that it was hard to be certain where your body ended and his began. 

He did grumble about it a bit, every once in a while. If Thor happened upon the two of you sitting together, inevitably the conversation would turn to whether the two of you could breathe, all caught up together like that. Loki would roll his eyes and make a comment about how you just needed to be touching him at all times, but he’d always tighten his arm around you to keep you from pulling away. There was also a secret fondness in his voice that led you to believe that he was only playing into his brother’s expectations of him. 

But then the brothers were called away on a mission of their own. Thor and Loki had been gone for weeks, off to some mysterious location with Steve and Wanda. No one else had been given much information, but you shuddered to think about what kind of mission would require the physical strength and the powers of that particular team. Beyond that, life in the Tower went on as normal. 

You’d just finished in the gym when you ran in to Bruce in the hallway. Like, actually ran into him, to the point that he had to reach out to grab your shoulders to keep you on your feet. After brushing off your apologies, he laughed and took a step away.

“You know, it’s weird seeing you by yourself. Seems like, lately, you and Loki are attached at the hip.” He grinned, and his eyes twinkled. “And the legs. And the sides. And usually the shoulders. And the cheeks. And sometimes the mouth.”

Heat rose into your cheeks. You were used to being teased for how touchy you were, but this felt especially uncomfortable, given the fact that you weren’t just Loki’s friend anymore. You tugged on your earlobe and looked away from him. “I—yeah, I guess I’m usually all over him, aren’t I? It’s kinda...weird…”

“No, not at all! It’s sweet! I think you’re good for him! He still tries so hard to make it look like he’s all cold and aloof, but that’s hard to do when he’s got someone like you in his lap. Keep it up! Don’t let me stop you!” Before he left, he reached to pull you in to kiss your forehead, and even you could tell that your smile didn’t reach your eyes.

His words were kind enough. Maybe they were even well-meaning. But they still weighed on you. You could be A Lot; you’d always known that. You were getting carried away. If you weren’t careful, Loki was going to get sick of you—if he wasn’t _already_. If Bruce had noticed enough of this to say something to you, the others had _definitely_ noticed. They were probably already getting sick of the constant PDA, weren’t they? You were being inconsiderate, not just of the man you loved so much, but also with all the rest of your friends. 

So when the team came back home, you went to greet them in the hangar but staunchly refused to fold yourself in against Loki’s body the very first chance you got. You gave everyone a bright smile and welcomed them home with sincerity in your voice. You kept your hands to yourself. They were all so exhausted and battered that they didn’t seem to notice or care. Okay, that was a good start. 

Even though it was clear that Loki was limping, you didn’t force him to stop by the med bay. You helped him to his room, and the whole way there, you took selfish pleasure in the weight of his arm around you—but, when you got there, you were quick to disengage so he could take a shower. Another day, you might have asked him if he wanted you to join him, and of course he would have humored you and invited you in with a lecherous wink, but today you just helped him close the shower curtain and then excused yourself from the bathroom, closing the door behind you to keep the warmth from escaping.

It was like torture, being around him but not allowing yourself to touch him. It did give you a good opportunity to take in the sight of him, though: his beautiful hair was drying into gentle waves. When you touched them all the time, you tended to destroy those curls. He looked exhausted, and the dark circles beneath his eyes seemed to call out to you to touch them, to fool yourself into thinking you could soothe them away just by mashing your fingers all over his face. But they gave him an elegant charm. He looked weary and exhausted, but he was still smiling at you. His face was otherworldly, every bit the astral prince. When you threw yourself at him, it was hard to take in the sheer perfection of his features. 

He shared his stories with you. His hands outlined shapes in the air before him. When you clutched his hand like it was something you could possess, he couldn’t gesture like that. He made you gasp with horror at key points in his tale, and then immediately afterwards he made you laugh when he broke the tension with a joke. It was so hard to keep from reaching out to grab his face so you could absolutely cover his cheeks and nose with kisses, but you managed. And he seemed happy.

A few times, he reached out to take your hand in his. You couldn’t bring yourself to pull away when he did it, but you did force yourself not to tighten your grip on him. You could allow yourself the comfort of his hand on yours, but you would not take more than he was offering. But lord, it felt weird. Whenever he reached for you, you couldn’t help but notice how _floppy_ your hand seemed. It had to be like holding a dead fish, right? 

This was how normal people interacted, you told yourself. Normal people weren’t so touch-starved and clingy that they needed to be entirely wrapped up in their loved one’s embrace. Normal people could have a conversation without touching someone else every two minutes. And people liked normal people. Loki seemed to like this version of you, at least, given how he seemed to brighten throughout your time together. It made you realize how much your touch must have been weighing him down before. You could hold back for him. It would just take some getting used to, that’s all.

When he asked you to stay the night here in his bed, you weren’t strong enough to turn him down. As he often did, he gave you one of his shirts to sleep in, and you went to brush your teeth in his bathroom with your spare toothbrush. Often, he’d come and join you, and wrap his hands around your hips to pull you backwards against him while you brushed, but tonight he left you alone. If that wasn’t a clear sign that he was only humoring you all those other times…

You stepped out of the bathroom into the darkened bedroom. He’d turned off the lights and pulled the covers down and stretched out on the side of the bed he always slept on when you joined him. You took your own spot and pulled the blanket up to your chin. Just as you were trying to decide whether it would be too much to go in for a good-night kiss ( _Seriously, normal people do it all the time. It’s not clingy to want to kiss your love goodnight, right? But the man has just come back from an exhausting mission. He’s probably already mostly asleep. Just leave him alone,_ _you crazy octopus-person_ _._ ), he turned onto his side to face you and propped his head up on his hand.

“What’s wrong? Have I done something to upset you?” He asked. His voice was so quiet. Did he sound worried, or was that just your imagination? He reached out his hand as though to touch your cheek, but then pulled it away. His eyes were wide and searching there in the dark, and your heart stuttered in your chest.

“What do you mean? Of course not. I love you, Loki, you know that. Are you okay?” Shoot. You’d tried so hard, tonight, to keep from letting your misery show on your face, but of course he’d picked up on it. This wasn’t his fault. None of this was his fault. You were the one who’d messed things up, so you were the one trying to put them right again. His gaze skittered away from yours.

“You’ve barely touched me all night. The whole time I was gone, the only thing that kept me going was the thought of how it’d feel to have you in my arms again when I got back, but it’s like you don’t want anything to do with me. Please tell me what I’ve done, darling. I’ll make it right. I’ll spend the rest of time making it up to you.” The earnestness in his voice hurt you. Slowly, things were clicking into place in your mind, and you were beginning to feel very stupid. You turned on your side to face him and reached out, hesitantly, to cup his cheek in your palm. His eyes fluttered closed and he pressed himself a little more firmly into your touch. Your heart was in your throat. 

“It’s not you, my prince, it’s… I’ve just been thinking about how...you know, _nonstop_ I am when it comes to touching you. Bruce said—well, it doesn’t matter what he said, but I realized that I never just let you _breathe_. I don’t want to suffocate you, Loki. I don’t want to drive you off. So I’ve been trying to give you space tonight, that’s all.”

You wanted to look away from him, but...you couldn’t. His brows furrowed as he made sense of your words, and when he opened his eyes, the anger there might have made you nervous if it weren’t for the way he pressed his hand against yours to keep you from pulling away.

“Breathe? Treasure of my heart, some days it feels as though I can’t breathe _unless_ you’re in my arms. It is true that, once, I hated to be touched, but that’s only because so many others have only ever touched me with malice. It has been a long time indeed that anyone has touched me with the warmth that you do. I can feel your love through your fingertips and through the weight of you against my skin. I can’t get enough of you.” He moved his hand, then, but it was only so he could reach out and touch _your_ cheek. He brushed his thumb along your cheekbone. “These hands of mine, they’ve only ever caused trouble. They’ve rained down pure hell upon your realm and many others, and still you allow me to touch you in ways I never thought to imagine I could. Where so many others—including everybody here in the Tower with us—tend to think of me as a threat to their continued well-being, you allow me to hold you at your most vulnerable. Do you know how _precious_ that is to me?”

Your eyes were stinging. Some combination of the heat of your own stupidity and the earnestness in his voice was making you want to cry. Surely he couldn’t blame you. Unable to find actual words, you shook your head just slightly. Just enough. Loki sighed a heavy, world-weary sigh and moved closer to you in the bed, and then wrapped his arm around your back to press you in against his chest. Once you were settled, his hand rested against the back of your head. He held you close. You couldn’t wriggle away from him if you wanted to.

But of course you didn’t want to.

“You are not suffocating me, my sweet love. You could never suffocate me. Even on the days where we barely part for a moment, I find myself longing for more of you. Please never worry about driving me away again. Now that I’ve had a taste of you, I can’t bear to be without you. I want more of you than you could possibly give to me, and I am entirely too selfish to give up the parts of you I’ve got. The others know nothing of how I feel. Do you understand me?”

He worked his fingers through your hair and massaged your scalp. Already the warmth and the scent of him were creeping inside you and finally allowing your muscles to relax. You clutched his shirt until your fingers ached and nodded because the lump in your throat would not permit you to speak. 

You slept deeply, wrapped up there in the arms of your lover, and, when the golden light of morning crept through his windows, you were still right there, your bodies pressed together as though they would never part again.


End file.
